Dealing with such unremitting bleakness was relatively easy on the adrenalin-charged way there, when hope sprang eternal and £5 predictions of a 1-0 City win, with Paul Parry the scorer, were being rung through to Ladbrokes.

But, in the sobering gloom of City’s defeat, having driven out of a concrete multi-storey that made the NCP by Cardiff Central Station look like the Taj Mahal, it almost required medication.

I never thought I would say this, but give me the post-match streets of Cardiff, awash with urine and discarded polystyrene chip trays over a rainy losing evening in this corner of north London any day of the week.

Of course, the outlook on Wembley last month after Dave Jones’ men had come through the semi-final was altogether rosier.

That day I recall pulling away from Wembley train station lauding the easiness of getting to and from the place and returning to South Wales to regale friends and colleagues with tales of how, despite it’s reputation, “you know, Wembley really isn’t that bad at all.”

I distinctly remember skipping to work on Monday April 7, whistling Oh What a Beautiful Morning all the way there having just had the Housemartins’ Happy Hour single on repeat play in the car.

Today is different. Instead, I am unable to get the appalling Pompey chimes out of my head.

My mobile bleeped with a text on the way home on Saturday night.

It was from a friend with Swansea City affiliations. The message was simple: “Play up Pompey. Pompey play up!”

I’m thinking of having hypnotherapy to erase the memory of that tune from my head altogether.

You had to be in the ground to appreciate the monotonous regularity with which Portsmouth supporters return to that song. It gets to the stage where it starts to sound like church bells outside your bedroom window the morning after 10 pints of Stella.

City fans, on the other hand, are guilty of no such repetitiveness.

As the back catalogue of tunes on our award-winning icWales website so amply demonstrates, Ninian Park regulars are not short of imagination when it comes to the vocal backing of their team. They even have their own version of one of football’s most popular choruses.

While City fans sing “They’re the greatest team in football, the world has ever seen...”, the rest of the country sings “They’re by far the greatest team, the world has ever seen...”

It’s a piece of originality that Cardiff followers should be proud of, just as they should be proud of the backing they gave their team on the big day.

Given that the colour blue has such a central place in the fabric of Cardiff City Football Club, it seemed incongruous that the City end was a sea of yellow and black throughout.

The Football Association had planted complimentary flags on every seat for both sets of supporters, and, of course, because Jones’ men were in their away strip the banners reflected that. But seeing the Portsmouth end as a mass of blue made the whole scene somewhat disconcerting, as if those horrible south coasters had stolen City’s clothes.

Yet the travelling hordes from this side of the Severn Bridge made the best of it – and took a huge amount of credit for their behaviour in defeat.

When two of the big four annually contest this final, it is customary for half the stadium to empty quicker than Gazza’s pint glass.

Not this time. Instead, at the final whistle you sensed an immediate wave of perspective from the Bluebirds ranks, as if this was an event they would never experience again and was therefore to be savoured in the knowledge that their team had enabled them to hold their heads up high, even if a golden opportunity had been missed.

There were tales afterwards of Pompey fans clapping City supporters on to their buses, with only the minority gloating.

If that’s true, then maybe this was indeed the people’s cup final, as some pundits christened it in the build-up.

But, for all the good grace in glory and defeat which made it so unlike a football occasion, I reiterate, Wembley is no place to lose.

Perhaps we should have taken it as an omen that this was not going to be a day for the Welsh when Katherine Jenkins’ microphone failed during the pre-match singing of Abide with Me.

And so it turned out.

As supporters headed out of London, on Saturday night, the M3 was probably fast becoming one big party procession.

But the M4 was different. The coaches we passed featured either heads resting on windows, the exhaustion of an emotionally draining day at last taking it’s toll, or sad reflective faces staring into space, counting down the miles.

A consoling few pints in the local before last orders rather than a victory celebration stretching into the small hours probably awaited most of them.

How different to the aftermath of the semi-final when it felt like Cardiff City could conquer the world.

The images of Barnsley will remain forever, but this was not Sunday, April 6, it was Saturday, May 17. The day Cardiff City fans discovered what a grim place Wembley can be.